Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Feeling Antagonistic.

Or maybe it's just the protocol talking  :)
I came prepared. With a barrage of questions. He only laughed a little :)

My IVF consult went well yesterday. Quite, well, in fact! We talked for a while about our TTC history, and the RE was fully supportive of moving on to IVF at this point. No "ehhh, you may have success with an additional IUI or two" or "geeee, you haven't really earned the big guns yet." Just a simple "From my perspective, I would recommend moving on." His main reasoning is that with the number of cysts that my ovaries present with (yesterday had 25 on righty and 20 on lefty), they aren't comfortable taking a more aggressive stim approach for an IUI. Afraid to wake the "sleeping giant" or something like that. So no WONDER we haven't had very good stimming for our two IUI's- their hands were tied, lest we populate a baseball team all in one go. Move over Octo-mom, Multiples-Meier-Mama is coming to town!

Because of my super cysty ovaries, he also recommended we go with the Antagonist protocol, which involves stimming with both Menopur and Gonal F or Follistim, and a Lupron trigger. He thinks that I'll have a great response to the stims given my "loaded gun ovaries", and wants to try and avoid OHSS by using the lupron trigger instead of an HCG trigger. I'll get more details when I talk to the coordinator. Oh, and he did say that it's our choice whether to use PIO or Endometrin during the TWW, and that the research suggests that they're equally effective... but he just feels more comfortable with PIO.

So with all that, the decision was pretty much made. We've stressed over this long enough. The fact that we got to this point sucks, but I have to put the doubt over what could have been behind me and get to my happy place. My happy "I'm going to have a needle shoved through my vaginal wall to retrieve mah behbehs after my ovaries have been inflated to the size of softballs" place. Ummm... that's a happy place, right? Right? <crickets>

He didn't see anything that he thought would indicate a need for more testing in terms of preemptively diagnosing an implantation failure. The only supplements he recommended were OTC prenatals. Dr Boy does need to go in for a repeat SA, mainly so they can do a much more in depth look at morphology. Our clinic requires that sperm hit a certain threshold for morphology in order to try to fertilize naturally, otherwise, they require ICSI. Either way, that's not a problem. He had fine morphology before. (side note- any supplements or other things he can do to improve morphology? 'Cause it'd be nice not to have to spend that $1500. Just in case.) I need to have a saline sonogram to check out the condition of the cute ute. That's pretty much it though!

We then had a date with wandy to check out the cyst. And to see if I can skip my period this round and go strait to BCP! I have about 7.2mm worth of lining built up, but NO dominant follicles. And it's CD19, so really? We can put this one in the books as annovulatory. Even better though, no cyst either! That sucker went away all on its own.

Because of the lack of a dominant follicle and the fact that the cyst shrunk down to nothing, he cleared me to start the BCP right away, without waiting for a new CD1. Which works WONDERS towards the whole getting on the calendar for a December cycle goal.

Long story short- we're good to go. I'm waiting to hear from the clinic's IVF schedule coordinator, but I will most likely be starting BCP this week to get ready for a Dec cycle! AHHHH!!!! Which means that by New Year's, I'll either have a BFP, or a really friggin' good reason to drink :)

10 comments:

  1. Holy crap, that was quick! But as the saying goes... When you know, you KNOW! Exciting that you'll likely be cycling in December- I hope everything continues to go smoothly for you. And as for the giant needle in your lady bits, it isn't as horrible as it sounds. Not something I'd sign up to do for fun, but it certainly isn't deterring me from a second round!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm so excited for you! It sucks that it's come to this, but at the same time you must feel so much relief at this point. Keeping my fingers crossed those ovaries do what they are suppose to!!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yay for getting things underway! We haven't found anything for morphology that OccDoc doesn't say 'that's ridiculous'. He needs to read an article about anything before he considers it. The acupuncturist seemed to think herbs would help, but OccDoc is resistant to take those particular herbs.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Wahoo! I'm excited for you!!!

    And side note...if they put you on estrogen patches after transfer, I've got two packages I never used that you can have!

    Eeek! Yay!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Yeah! I always feel better with a solid plan in place! I am glad they decided to do a lupron trigger with you - my 1st ivf was with a hcg trigger and I had horrible OHSS. I always have 20+ follies on each side before any stims. With a lupron trigger, they often have to freeze all the eggs anyway to avoid OHSS but the wait is worth it. It gives your body time to recover and then you can do a FET. I was really hesitant about that protocol but I have had OHSS 3 times and I didn't want to risk that again. Good luck!

    ReplyDelete
  6. This is exciting!

    As far as morphology, my doc recommended some vitamins and after about 40+ days of use, she said that H's morphology looked better. We still have yet to go back for the repeat SA as he also had varicocele repair (which will help improve morphology eventually too)

    Might be worth a try even if timing is off. She recommended: GNC's fertility blend for men. She said she has seen some amazing results with these vitamins with other men. But H actually used: GNLD's Masculine Herbal complex (he is a distributor for their vitamins)

    Hope that helps!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Assuming this comment works: HOORAY!! Can't wait to follow along!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Sounds like you have a great and fast acting plan in place!! How exciting. I would recommend ICSI to anyone based on our results. My hubby has AMAZING counts and numbers so we weren't going to do it. My RE did 50/50 just to be sure and only 1 egg fertilized naturally. Even with great sperm you can't always account for the eggs. I think PCOS tends to make our eggs crap so it's something to consider.

    I can't wait to hear all about your cycle. I can't believe you are able to get in before the Holidays, fantastic!

    Do you know why they chose the antagonist protocol?

    I had much better results with PIO than endometrin. I absorbed much more and my levels were much higher when it the progesterone was associated with a huge needle going into my ass.

    ReplyDelete
  9. My doc said a multivitamin, vitamin C and anything with antioxidants to help with morphology. My hubby had some problems initially, but with the vitamins, all looked good.

    Good luck! I'll have my fingers crossed for you!

    ReplyDelete
  10. I like this doctor, he is assertive. :)

    I have a question...with all of those cysts...are you in a lot of pain? I'm going crazy with mine lately and I wanted to know what you do to cope!

    Congrats and good luck!!!

    ReplyDelete

You know you want to tell me how ridiculous I am...